THE SHOOTOUT 2018Live Reports

DAY 1

The Shootout has begun! Two teams have now gathered and spent the first day practising and honing their skills. The first competition round challenges the participants to capture creative and captivating images of nudibranchs. Both resorts have large numbers of these charismatic animals, making them ideal venues.

Team Gulen started off the day with organizer Adam Hanlon chatting though how the contest will be structured, followed by Gulen’s Guido Schmitz emphasising the centre’s policy on diving.

They were immediately followed by team captain Keri Wilk presenting a comprehensive talk focusing on creative techniques that may be useful for capturing stunning images of nudibranchs. Inevitably the first day also involved a fair amount of shake down, as the team tried out camera, lens and lighting combinations.

Fortunately, the dives were all on Gulen’s excellent house reef, allowing both the opportunity for easy experimentation and lots of shorter dives with varying objectives and configurations.

After a busy day’s shooting, the team gathered for an evening meal after which Keri presented a review of some of the participant’s images. Based on what we saw tonight, Team Lembeh have got a serious fight on their hands….

Tomorrow is the contest day, and Team Gulen have to have produce their images ready for submission by 8pm. The public vote will then open at 10pm (CEST). Please visit uwshootout.com and place your vote for your favourite.

DAY 2 – Nudibranch Competition Day

Team Lembeh

Today was the first competition day and the subject is nudibranchs. Voting for images will open at 4am Indonesia time and 10pm Norway time. Please visit The Shootout to cast your one vote for your favourite nudibranch shot.

After a good breakfast, the Lembeh team headed out to tackle their nudibranch shots.

Full of vim and vigor away we went with full boats.

Selecting images to submit for the Nudibranch category.

Thank you for voting!!!

Team Gulen

Gulen provided us with amazing mill pond like calm conditions for the first of The Shootout’s competition days. Today’s goal is to create amazing imagery of nudibranchs, which will then be entered into a public vote that will go live at 10pm Norway time.

Surprise news this morning was that Gulen Dive Resort’s owner, Ørjan Sandnes, had decided to join the team! Local knowledge is indeed a useful thing.

So the team has been diving and capturing images of nudibranchs on Gulen’s amazing house reef all day.

Conditions are challenging, with cool green water and somewhat limited visibility, but the team has worked hard to produce images.

The good news is that there are lots of nudibranchs. Most participants did at least three dives, often of over an hour in 8°C water. Team Gulen are a hardy bunch!

In between, team captain Keri Wilk has been diving, coaching, cajoling and advising. Team members have been editing, discussing and sharing images all day.

There is an amazing collaborative spirit here, with team members freely sharing ideas, equipment and props with each other.

There is also a bunch of gear involved: after a full day’s diving, the whole team gathered at 8pm to select the team’s entries for the contest. Judging by the lively discussion emanating, it sounds like there are lots of stunning images chose from.

Once the team has finalised their selection, these will be entered into the live public vote. This is where we ask you to view both team’s images and to pick your favourite. Please note that you are only able to vote for one image (per contest round), so view all the images and then select your favourite…